Brand-new on Netflix: Stranger Things

It's 1983. In the unsightly little village of Hawkins, in the American state of Indiana, 12-year-old Will suddenly vanishes mysteriously. Subsequently a number of strange things come to light, such as secret experiments in a government lab, a monster, supernatural powers and a strange girl called Eleven.

In eight episodes the somewhat nerdy friends of the missing boy, with the help of Eleven, try to find him. Not without trouble and incidents ...

IMDb-rating9.1/10

LanguageEnglish

Duration55 minutes

GenreHorror, drama

Seasons1

Target groupAdults

Trailer

8 episodes full of suspense

Ode to the 80's ...

Directors and brothers Matt and Ross Duffer made this series with a lot of love for the genre of supernatural films from the eighties.

And that love for the eighties is evident throughout. This is a world without smartphones and unlimited home entertainment. Instead there are walkie-talkies, posters of Jaws and the card game Dungeons and Dragons. The camera angles, too, are borrowed from classics such as E.T. and Alien. But it's all subtly done. That makes it fun not just for the generations that actually lived through the 80's, but also for the young twenty-somethings among you.

... with a tremendous cast

Central to the whole story is the boys' search for their missing best friend. And what a great performance by these young actors. Or in the words of the directors themselves: there are no other kids that could have played these parts. Indeed, the roles were made to measure for them. And that applies to Millie Brown as well, who portrays Eleven with few words but great depth.

In addition, the cast is led by the talented Winona Ryder. Not by chance is she an actress we still remember well from quite a few top roles in the eighties.

Some fun facts

The composers wrote more than 13 hours of music for the series.

The voice of Gaten Matarazzo (Dustin) changed so much during the production, that it was impossible to make additional voice recordings later.

Millie Brown (Eleven) actually did have to shave off her long hair. Only after she saw how cool Charlize Theron is in Mad Max: Fury Road, did she agree to do so.

Before the writers started working on the series, they watched a whole lot of movies together from the eighties, such as E.T., A Nightmare on Elm Street and other classics.